OLD CRUSTY'S PRESCRIPTION

Auckland Star, Volume LVIII, Issue 20, 25 January 1927, Page 5

OLD CRUSTY'S PRESCRIPTION

(By ALEXANDER MEREDITH.)

(COMPLETE SHORT STORY.)

Dick Gordon, chemist's assistant, having 110 customer before him for tlie moment, was reviewing his three personal problems; to get cheaper apartments inside a week, to send support to his mother recently widowed and to marry Sister Morrow according to

engagement, when he opened a shop of his own.

Before lie found any solution, old Crusty tottered in. Dick called him Mr. Slagg and he called Dick Mr. Gordon. He had locked up hi# e 1111 >t ■> shop next door, the one with ' Retiring From Business" in the window, for the last time. His cough was even tighter, his step shorter, than usual (and his nose required attention which it did not get from his hanky). Two or three street urchins.. his ordinary retinu"e_, desisted from plucking his coat tails.' dinging his hat and other marks of respect and retired when they saw Dick eye them sternly from behind his counter. '"Well, Mr. Slagg, want another little mixture made up': Or would you like help putting up your shutters or moving something?" "Xo more 'elp, thankee, Mr. Gordon. I've closed for good an' all. You've been a good neighbour. Ay, a good friend. I 'most think the best, next to Bill. But 'e's' my own flesh an' blood, an' all I 'ave too." "So you'll not be back':" "Xo, not back no more, though the rent's paid to the end of the month. I 'oped to 'ang on till Bill came 'ome this day week. 'E's a steward on the Astral now. But I'm too far through." ''I must come round to your lodgings and see you." "Do. Mr. Gordon. And 'ere's a little prescription you might give Bill, an' the key o' the shop, in case anythink 'appens to me afore 'e comes. They're very important. Promise you'll do it." "I promise faithfully; but I can't make much of the prescription." Crusty made as near an approach to a laugh as he had ever made. "I thought you wouldn't; but Bill'll know." "But in case there's any mishap? Seafaring's risky work, you know." "Bless ye, Vll turn up. Bill alius does. But if anythink 'appens 'im, then it's yours. There's nobody else for it. But 'e'll turn up. 'E'll turn up."

Dick shook hands with the lonely, feeble, old man, whose champion and benefactor he had been for years. Crusty's little pre?; Option was: looiffdairr Xpogeroir rm Sfrheood er, Hlettmrffge.

"Looks like Welsli poetry." mused Dick, putting it and the key in his pocket. ''I often thought Crusty was a Welshman/' "Astral sunk in collision. All hands lost." This is what Dick heard and saw proclaimed by the newsvendors as he went home with an appetite to a frugal dinner a few evenings later. He.stopped short to think it out. 'SNiee :mess now. - Crusty dead without" viteible means,' buried at public expense and I'm his executor to hand over a Welsh prescrpition and a key, I wish it was a key to the prescription, to his own relative, who is sunk. I'd better keep quiet about the matter. I've trouble enough already. But wait. The blooming thing's mine now; so I needn't bother any more. However, I'll ask Nellie to read" it, for a lark; and the key is due to the landlord at the end of the month. Poor old Slagg'."

Alter dinner he hunted for cheap rooms without success. Anything he saw was too mean and dirty for his sense of decencv.

'"No use." said tired Dick . "I'll aek Xellie if she knows of any place."

His faith in Nellie was unbounded. In the hospital she was known as Sister Morrow, and next evening was the most important in the week, for she would be off duty, and would be at a certain spot at a certain hour. Dick would be there too.

'•'This is my evening, Dick, and I've such a treat for you. A patient of mine connected with the Xew Winter Gardens, has given me two tickets." Dick knew she was lying, in order to spare his pocket, and his manhood secretly rebelled; but woman's wit had been too much for him, so off they went. "We can have pantomime, wireless, dancing, varieties, and supper. Which do you prefer-Srst?" '"I could do with a pantomime and some slipper, if you are that way inclined."

"Come along, old chap. Pant<y and eupper be it."

While they waited for the rise of the curtain, she got a further opportunity for lying. "I don't like the place where I am living, Xellie." He didn't sav why. "Can you put me on the track "of new 'digs'?"

Snuggling up close to him. with a look of new-born innocence and truth, she took his lead.

"I think I can, and on the track of a wedding too. Mr. Dickson, the suburban chemist on the Rieiiborouph Road, is beyond hope, and his wife wants to soil the stock and rent the shop. It's the very place for you." ''Nellie, dear, you make my mout'i water: but what about the ready, the needful ?"

'"That's tlie easiest part. A girl on our staff, she asked me no: K> mention her name, has money in Post Office deposits and securities. I've been telling

her how silly she is to keep it there, | when I can get her a borrower to use it j in business, and pay her far better for it. Take it, Dick, and give the poor girl a helping hand.'* Dick knew full well who the poor girl was. and his manhood again became selfassertive. "Couldn't think of letting her run the risk. But I'll tell you what. I'll ask my firm if they'll take the shop as a branch, and put me in charge. Can there be & wedding in that case? ' Nellie pouted. "Well, it's not what I bargained for. I said a shop of your own. But it's the next best thing." "Talking of shops. Nellie, old Crusty*s dead and buried since I saw you." "Crusty?" "Yes. Slagg was his name. You've heard me speak oi the old fruiterer." I •"Poor old man. \ oil were hie caam- | pion in your crusades against his tor- i mentors, and his helper in matters bevond his strength." Dick told her of the paper and the loss of Bill at sea. Taking the '"prescription"' from his pocket-book, he handed it to her. "You can stand two suppers, if you decipher. If not, I pay." Eager to be allowed to pay for something. he congratulated himself on now backing a safe thing, and he watched her face for evidence of perplexity, and prepared to rub his hands and gloat. To his surprise, she lowered her head as if trying to recall something, and then met his gaze triumphantly. '"By Jove, Dick, I have it. Slagg was the very name. It never struck me before. Done, sir. I buy supper, and I'll give you a free translation at the table." Dick was speechless. But the rise of the curtain covered his defeat. At the supper table, after an enjoyable pantomime, she again took the paper and examined it, and told him io find a place on the shop floor eight feet and live from door and grate respectively. '"Nonsense, Nellie. How dye make that out 1 :" "Shan't tell you now, you are so unbelieving." Then relenting, she said, "I'll give you the very words and prove them right, when you open your own shop or that branch you suggest. But why not prove my solution correct yourself meantime and without paper?" "You mean " "I mean, it's worth your while doing what I told you the paper says."

Closing the door behind him and locking it on the inside, Dick took from his hand bag, candle and. matches, and soon had a light. As he looked round the empty shop, without fruit and without Crusty, he experienced an uneasy, scared feeling, although he could hear the people passing on the street. Would they see him and take hiui for a burglar? There was nothing to burgle, and the blinds were down and the shutters up.

Like many another young man, "Dick didn't know the length of his own boots, so he had put a measuring tape in his bag. Beginning at the door, lie measured eight feet into the room and arrived behind the counter, where he made a pencil mark' oil the faded green cork linoleum. This mark was opposite the grate right enough, but too far from

it. Advancing right up to the grate at right angles to his first direction, he measured back again five feet fropij.it and made another mark.

The "prescription" had been followed, but he could see no result.

What about the old linoleum? It fitted the floor behind the counter right to the; counter and walls. He tried to roll it from the end at the grate, and once started it rolled easily. When he had rolled as far as his mark, he made, with care, a corresponding mark on the floor beneath.

This portion of the floor seemed to have been repaired with half a dozen short lengths of board. Perhaps he could raise the marked one. No. Tt was firmly fastened down, and he noticed that all the short lengths had four small screws each instead of the ordinary nails. He had no screw-driver. The broken blade of his pocket-knife might do, if the screws were not too tight. They had evidently been out recenrly for they turned easily. With the point of his pocket?knife he raised the board. Putting his hand into the opening and groping about, he felt nothing but a smooth surface.

So he had all his trouble for nothing. He sat on the floor and laughed at himself.

Suddenly he stopped laughing. The under surface was very smooth—too smooth. He went for the candle, looked into the hole, and saw a small square of the same linoleum as covered the floor. Raising this, he found underneath, three small, dirty, coarse linen bags, which he lifted out—two light and one heavy. He wasn't laughing now. He loosened the neck of one—banknotes. He untied a second—treasury notes. The third — sovereigns. He looked in and groped again. That was all. l'or some minutes he .-at on the floor i stupified. ! Then he screwed in the board, replaced I the linoleum, put the bags. tape and candle in his hand-bai:. waited for a ! moment till the footsteps of a pa-«er-by[ had died away came out. locked the doov.j and took home the medicine wLk-.i i Crusty had prescribed. ; "The landlord."' he remarked to him-l self, "can now have the key any time. ,

'•Lni.k* all it Nellie? I wonder if thilt trill oil your staff, thej one with the money, would l»e willin™ to] come in with it a- 1 h partner, and share the jiri.fit-." Dick her thi- on the next even-' out. as they inspected his new shop and stock, bought outripht. on the Riehhoruuph Koad. He spoke manfully now, as became a man of means.

j She put her two hand? in hi?. "Yes, Dick, and also to share your sorrows, which 1 hope will be few, and to double "your joy s." Dick sealed the contract in true lover's fashion. "Tell me, Nellie, how you read the 'prescription.' ". "We had a seafaring patient with a, broken leg some years ago, jas William Slagg, noted for his powerfrl I thirst and choice language. One day his father sent up a note lor him by the i hall porter, it wasn't visiting day. [ I could make nothing of the note an I gave it to William, who borrowed ui\" iouutain j>eu and wrote a reply. "Kcail the blinkin" billy-do if you like. Sister.' he said with a wicked smile, as he handed me his note. 'My precious old .£.d taught me that n>i." It was Dutch to me: but on the way to the lobby to give it to the porter for him I noticed that, the la>t letter in each line w;*.s wet, while each fir>t letter was quite dry. It had dried from left to right instead of from top to bottom, line by line. He wrote the nrst letter in each line, travelling downward-, then the second letters and so on. It was simi-ly a message asking his father to smvik ill some grog with him uu visiting dav.""

They examined I.'rusty's paper together and found the exact reading.

In shop floor eight feet from d'K»r aml five from grate. Dick got permission, without giving any reason except j>ersonal friendship, to enclose the old man's grave and erect a handsome little slab with a suitable inscription. This was the only acknowledgment now in his power to make.